I was 12 years old and had just started big school

My Bible: reasons to believe in the power of the Bible

'I was 12 years old and had just started big school and the Gideons gave us a pocket New Testament. My background was not religious. But within the first year, I started to read it on the bus on the way home.

I liked books. We were a close family. We'd just had a couple of close deaths. My uncle died in his thirties and my grandfather had died within a few months. My Dad was in the US working.

So, I was asking all sorts of questions: why are we here? I became captivated by this person coming out from the pages of the book. The book was reading me. It was no ordinary book.

This person, Jesus Christ, was coming out of the pages at me. My favourite verse is John 17.3, "Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent."

That became my quest. I wanted to know that person.

A year later Jesus of Nazareth was on television. I was glued to it. At the crucifixion, I was in tears, in tears, in tears. I cried for hours.

My parents didn’t know what to do with me. Jesus became enfleshed as a person then. It definitely changed me as a person after that. I used to bully my brothers and sisters and beat them up, and I stopped. I was definitely different. The Bible was instrumental in me becoming a Christian.'

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